I’m the West Coast representative for Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum. I was a political columnist for SFGate.com (San Francisco Chronicle online) from 2004-2008. I've written for the Algemeiner, Daily Caller, Washington Examiner, Independent Journal Review, American Thinker, FrontPage Magazine, Jihad Watch, Family Security Matters, Accuracy In Media, Newsbusters, Israel National News, Jewish Press, J-The Jewish News Weekly of Northern California, and many others.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

The Emerging "Foleygate" Story

Some thoughts on the matter...

I think it's clear that this is being used as a Democratic Party election ploy---the October surprise we've all been waiting for. The idea is to discourage socially conservative Republicans from coming out to vote next month.

It's also clear that there's a doublestandard for such behavior when it applies to Democrats and that the Republicans are far more likely to be held accountable.

And it's clear that the Democrats are hypocrites when it comes to issues involving gay sexuality. Leftist opposition to the Boy Scouts prohibition of gay scout masters comes to mind.

However...

Time will tell whether any actual tampering of Foley's e-mail or IM exchanges were involved, as is being investigated in the blogosphere. Until then, we cannot be sure.

If what's being alleged is true, Foley's actions appear to have been quite contemptible and his resignation is a necessary and just step. If other House Republicans took part in helping to cover up his sexual proclivities, then they too bear some responsibility. Not that "outing" Foley in today's politically correct climate would have been an easy task. But it would have been the right thing to do.

Let's face it, there's much corruption (both monetary and moral) among the upper ranks of government, and both parties are involved. Sometimes it seems like the decadence that destroyed the Roman Empire is overtaking our own.

But in an age of 24-hour media, it's up to each of us to process these scandals as thoroughly as we can, rather than jumping to conclusions arrived at by either side.

First, if Democrats (and friend George Soros if it turns out the infomation came from him) are so concerned about "the children" then why did they hang on to this story until 30 days before an election?

Second, Republicans always step down right away when accused, (even in the case of Delay and others where allegations were not proven) while Democrats have to have power ripped from their claws. Take William Jefferson, Democrat, Louisiana for example versus Duke Cunningham. Or Barbara Boxer with the House banking scandal versus Jack Abrahamoff (though a lobbyist not an elected official). Or Bill Clinton versus Richard Nixon. Seems kind of a double standard to me.

I hate to see any elected official involved in this sort of thing, especially Republicans. I want to think of our leaders as a cut above. But Foley certainly does not represent the whole party.

Watch for more "surprises" from the left every Friday before the next election.

Some people perhaps need to read up on the facts before flailing about with desperate spin to blame the democrats, blame the pages, blame the liquor, or say it's just what gays do (even though more than 95% of pedophiles are straight men). As you can read from scores of different sources or from a summary at Media Matters:

"ABC chief investigative correspondent Brian Ross has debunked this claim, noting that his sources for the story, to the extent that they had partisan affiliations, were Republicans. None of the conservatives making this allegation has offered any indication as to when the Democrats supposedly obtained the emails, and indeed after making the allegation, Hastert acknowledged he had no evidence. The only specific allegations have been levied against Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) organization that says it received copies of the emails in July and immediately sent them to the FBI. Hannity and U.S. News & World Report senior writer Michael Barone suggested that CREW withheld the emails from the House leadership and timed their release "for maximum political advantage." In fact, as Media Matters noted, CREW sent the emails to the FBI on July 21, and the House GOP leadership knew of the emails by winter 2005 at the very latest -- long before CREW obtained them -- but failed to notify the Democrats on the congressional Page Board. Therefore, if one were to assume -- against all the evidence to the contrary -- that Hastert, Savage, Limbaugh, Hannity, Barone, and Malkin are correct, and Democrats or CREW had advance knowledge of the Foley emails but sat on them until they could be used for maximum political benefit, that would not change the fact the fact that the House leadership, with responsibility over the pages and in the best position to investigate further, knew of emails at least as early as late 2005 and did not share them with the full Page Board, nor did it undertake a full investigation of the matter."

Spin spin spin. Any party that holds power for too long is bound to have corruption problems - Republican and Democrats alike. It's time to clean house.

Diurnalist correctly points out that Foley is not a pedophile but a pederast (though he also had an age-appropriate boyfriend at home). The "pedophile" label has been thrown around by the right and the left to serve their own purposes.

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I’m the West Coast representative for Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum. I was a political columnist for SFGate.com (San Francisco Chronicle online) from 2004-2008. I've written for the Algemeiner, Daily Caller, Washington Examiner, Independent Journal Review, American Thinker, FrontPage Magazine, Jihad Watch, Family Security Matters, Accuracy In Media, Newsbusters, Israel National News, Jewish Press, J-The Jewish News Weekly of Northern California, and many others.